Category: News update

The Islamic World Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) gives much importance in its current policies and plans that directly affect the region and Member States that are at higher risk of the world health crisis triggered by Covid-19. Along this line, ICESCO, launched a new initiative entitled “African Language Bridges of Culture and History,” as part of its projects falling under “ICESCO Digital Home.” The role of the African peoples’ local languages is of primary importance as it disseminates basic knowledge and facilitating the exchange of information and guidance among all groups of society,
Through this new initiative, ICESCO aims to contribute to the efforts geared towards raising health awareness to prevent the African communities from Covid-19.  

It desires to promote the cultural, social, and educational roles of local African languages and connect the African peoples with their heritage written in the Arabic script.  Further, it will provide media platforms in local African languages, keep these languages up-to-date with information technology, and showcase the strong historical ties between the Arabic language and the Sub-Saharan African languages.

This initiative, which falls under a joint project with the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) for using the Arabic script in writing the languages of the Muslim communities in Africa, comprises educational, scientific, and cultural themes. It includes three ambitious programs in cooperation with the International University of Africa in the Republic of Sudan (Yusuf Al-Khalifa Center for Writing Languages in Arabic letter), including a program for computerizing the African languages by designing computer keyboards for fifteen (15) languages and developing unique applications for the automated Arabic script; a program for developing the system of writing African languages in the Arabic script by providing educational tools and materials, organizing training sessions for experts on the Arabic script, and preparing reading textbooks, teacher manuals, and educational media; in addition to another program for the establishment of academic chairs.

This initiative also takes into account the social and awareness-raising dimension in the health field by posting infographics and videos in the African languages on the prevention from Covid-19.

The languages covered by the initiative are Hausa, as the second-largest language in Africa after Arabic by the number of speakers distributed over more than eight African countries.  The Swahili, as the third-largest by the number of speakers in more than seven countries. And the rest are Mandinka, Fula, Wolof, Fu, Nobiin, Beja, Beni Amer, Yoruba, Comorian, the Somalian language Zaghawa; Luganda and Songhay.

The celebration of World Heritage Day on 18 April of each year is an occasion to highlight the rich, diverse, and authentic tangible and intangible cultural heritage of the Islamic world.
This Day is an occasion to enlighten the wider public about the richness and diversity of the world heritage and archeological sites around the globe, and showcase the efforts exerted, as part of the Convention Concerning the Protection of the World’s Cultural and Natural Heritage of 1972, to conserve and preserve this heritage from destruction and neglect.
In this context, we should recall the great attention paid by the Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) to preserve the cultural heritage in general, raise awareness to its role, sound the alarm from destruction during times of crisis. The support provided by the Organization to help restore and promote this heritage has been demonstrated in many referenced documents. These include advancing the Initiative on the Proclamation of 2019 as the Year of Heritage in the Islamic World, and the Islamic Declaration on the Preservation of Cultural Heritage in the Islamic World. All these documents stressed the need for immediate intervention and a contractual framework between the governmental sectors, the regional and international organizations, and civil society organizations to develop a shared roadmap to protect the cultural heritage.
Since 2019, ICESCO has adopted a new strategy based on a more inclusive and realistic vision to preserve the Islamic world’s cultural heritage. Following its inception, the concept started to show positive results clearly, encouraging us to look forward to further achievements in the protection of heritage components, primarily the cultural and civilizational heritage of Al-Quds Al-Sharif “Capital of the State of Palestine” against Judaization, looting and theft.
ICESCO has also provided the needed framework, most notably the adoption of the establishment of the Islamic World Heritage Center during the last Session of ICESCO Executive Council, held on 29-30 January 2020, in Abu Dhabi. These included the activation of the Islamic World Heritage Committee, the expansion of its missions, the development of its operating mechanisms, and the promotion of its roles, particularly in the Islamic World Heritage List. Also, the establishment of the Heritage Protection Observatory to identify the situation of and dangers threatening heritage in the Islamic world and the Heritage Project Fund, which will provide the necessary support for the authorities in charge of heritage in Member States.
This year, World Heritage Day is celebrating in exceptional circumstances amid the crisis of COVID-19, which has obliged over half the world population to stay home and led to the closure of most heritage sites, historical landmarks and museums, which used to be open for visitors.
Amid the current health emergency, ICESCO has launched several comprehensive initiatives to provide alternative programmes, including initiatives in the cultural field such as “Distance Culture,” which includes posting free training videos on the preservation of the cultural heritage on its YouTube Channel.
During these critical situations, ICESCO calls on world countries, regional and international organizations, to take necessary measures to limit the negative fallout of this pandemic on the cultural heritage sector in its entirety.
Let us draw strength from the protection of our civilizational heritage. Let us unite for a better future for humanity.
Let us rally together to overcome this pandemic crisis.

The Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) and Naif Arab University for Security Sciences (NAUSS) will launch a series of online lectures on dealing with crises and catastrophes, on 20-21 April 2020, as part of the efforts geared toward countering the negative repercussions of Covid-19.
The two-day lectures programme includes six (6) lectures to be delivered by experts. The first lecture tackles the “Role of Public Relations in Dealing with Crises” and starts at 12:30 GMT+3. The second lecture explores “Public Diplomacy – Countries’ Key Tool to Face Covid-19” while the third lecture sheds light on “Health Crisis Management and Role of Various Sectors in the Management of Covid-19”.
On day two, the first lecture will start at 13:00 on “Major Information Strategies to be Used in Responding to Crises” while the second lecture will tackle the “Role of Technology in Limiting the Spread of the Pandemic”. The programme closes with a lecture on the “Role of Communication Technology and Information Applications in Supporting the Efforts to Counter Covid-19 Crisis”.
Participation in the lectures is open to anyone interested to join the specialists and people concerned. For participation, please fill in the form on the hyperlink below:

https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=pGPLp-wxGUy_4-eQKGz-ZJ2W6rESSRdHsOqGcHwPNbRUREQ2UDdFSlBFVzRWV01VVFdPWExGUUZXQS4u

The Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) announced the launch of ICESCO Short Film Award, as part of its “Distance Culture” under the “ICESCO Digital Home” Initiative. The award will be presented to the best three short films as follows: US$ 8,000, US$ 6,000 and US$ 4,000, respectively.

ICESCO stated that this award aims to encourage young people to be artistically creative, discover their talents in producing fiction and documentary films, and disseminate the culture of peace. The Award also aims to encourage film production, set up ICESCO Library of Short Films, anticipate what can be referred to as “life economy” and anticipate future working patterns, creativity, production, and jobs.

In addition, participating films should fall under the following categories: drama, documentary, heritage and folklore, human values, health and environment, children films, daily life in time of Coronavirus (COVID- 19), and comedy. The film may contain natural sounds or music without audible speech (nature and animal films).

To qualify for the award, the short film should:

1.      Not exceed 4 minutes in length;

2.      Not have been submitted to another competition before;

3.      Not undermine human, religious or national values;

4.      Be subtitled in one of ICESCO’s three official languages (Arabic, English and French);

5.      Be sent to film@icesco.org.

ICESCO also stated that the National Commissions and competent parties in Member States will take part in announcing the Award and ICESCO will set up a jury for selecting winning short films. The awards will be given at a special ceremony to be held at ICESCO headquarters in Rabat, Kingdom of Morocco.

It is noteworthy that as part of its Distance Culture initiative, ICESCO has created an award to three students in each of the following creative fields: Short story writing, making a painting; and musical composition or creative work. The value of the prizes stands at USD 6,000, USD 4,000, and USD 2,000, respectively.

Today, the Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) started publishing a set of video clips on cultural heritage topics, as part of its “ICESCO Digital Heritage” Initiative and “Distance Culture” Programme. The video clips document training programmes supervised by experts on the protection and preservation of heritage, especially in times of crisis.
These programmes seek to remotely train and build the capacities of the staff working in heritage fields and ensure the public’s benefit therefrom. Accessible on ICESCO’s website www.icesco.org, these programmes cover the following topics:
• General principles of the documentation of intangible heritage and national inventories;
• Museum management in the Islamic world;
• Documentation of cultural heritage through AI applications;
• Management of risks, crises, and disasters in heritage sites and museums;
• Techniques of inscribing heritage sites and landmarks on the Islamic World Heritage List (IWHL) and the World Heritage List (WHL);
• Rehabilitation of endangered handicrafts;
• Protection of underwater cultural heritage.
These programmes form part of the efforts of ICESCO to support the Member States and their competent authorities in the fight against Coronavirus (COVID-19) and find alternative solutions to ensure the sustainability of their educational, scientific and cultural undertakings during this difficult period.

 The Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) closely follows the developments and urgent situations triggered by the spread of Covid-19, particularly the closure of the educational institutions after the lockdown imposed by many countries. Within this context, ICESCO works in cooperation with Misk Foundation to support the international community’s efforts and Member States’ initiatives to counter this crisis by stepping up their measures, implementing effective intervention mechanisms and addressing the present emergency.

In this regard, ICESCO and Misk Foundation will provide urgent financial and technical support to 23 countries from all the geographical regions of ICESCO Member States. Four countries until now benefited from this programme, namely Palestine, Senegal, Burkina Faso, and Niger.  The programme procured and distributed the necessary digital and audio-visual equipment to the relevant authorities to support the efforts of the educational institutions amid this crisis, strengthen their capacity, develop their performance in dealing with the challenges posed by Covid-19. Furthermore, the programme ensures the continuity of the educational process by producing audio-visual educational contents, recording and broadcasting courses via the internet, and providing the digital educational content for all learners. Such measures are likely to upgrade the mechanisms of distance education and promote their educational role in coordination with the National Commissions in Member States concerned.

Misk Foundation is among the major non-profit organizations in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It provides support to different regions of the world in the fields of education, literature, culture, social sciences, technology, and the business sector. Misk establishes partnerships in its fields of action with international organizations, including ICESCO, through which joint programmes are launched in the fields of education, culture, media, and support for youth.

The Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) expresses its support for the initiative His Majesty Mohammed VI, King of Morocco, addressed to the heads of African states to create an operational framework to aid African countries in addressing Coronavirus (COVID-19) in order to allow for sharing expertise and best practices to handle the health, economic and social repercussions of the pandemic.
In this regard, ICESCO reaffirms its willingness to contribute to achieving the initiative’s objectives which are in line with its objectives and strategic vision and those of its cultural, scientific and educational initiatives launched since the beginning of the crisis. These initiatives consist of providing logistic support and technical advice and expertise in its fields of competence and action areas.
The Organization renews its support for all the calls likely to help its Member States, especially the African ones, in facing the present and future impacts of the pandemic and reaffirms that interstate solidarity and cooperation is the only way to overcome this crisis.

The Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) has announced the nomination requirements, the Jury’s composition and evaluation of nomination files for 200,000 US dollar-worth ICESCO Prize for Fighting Novel Coronavirus (Covid-19). The Prize has been earmarked by ICESCO to reward anyone who has discovered an efficient cure or vaccine against Coronavirus. To this effect, the Organization invites independent researchers, group of researchers or research institutions to send their nominations as from 15 April 2020.
In its call for nominations, ICESCO stated that in the face of the international health crisis that affects humanity, the world is in dire need of more medical and scientific research to find effective and sustainable solutions to today’s challenges. In response to World Health Organization’s appeal to the international community to “seize every opportunity to halt, contain, combat and delay the spread of the virus, and mitigate its impact”, ICESCO launches its Prize for Fighting the Novel Coronavirus (COVID19).
It added that a jury will be set up and chaired by ICESCO Director General. It will comprise two representatives of specialized international organizations and four scientists to be selected from leading world universities and internationally recognized research centers. The Jury’s Secretariat will be seated at ICESCO headquarters in Rabat, Kingdom of Morocco.
To submit a nomination for the Prize, the independent researcher, group of researchers or research institutions having announced the discovery of an effective cure or a vaccine against the novel Coronavirus has to send a complete file to the Secretariat of the Jury, including:
• The Prize Nomination Form which is available on ICESCO’s website www.icesco.org;
• A detailed report on the discovery;
• CV of the independent researcher or group of researchers. In case of a research institution, the CV of the lead scientific expert;
• Patent registration with an official competent authority;
• All supporting technical documents likely to support the claim of the discovery (3 recommendation letters to support nomination).
As for the procedures and duties of the Jury, the Organization reaffirmed that upon receipt of the nomination files, the Jury will then convene to review the validity of the claimed discoveries, and may seek additional expert opinion and guidance from national health authorities, the World Health Organization or any entity it deems necessary. Based on the aforementioned, the jury will issue a decision to award the Prize to the independent researcher, group of researchers or research institution and will inform ICESCO Director General accordingly. The Director General of ICESCO will then inform the winner of the Prize Award.
The award ceremony will be held at ICESCO headquarters with the participation of the winner, who will receive ICESCO medal in addition to the Prize, the members of the jury, partner organizations and invited scientists and researchers.

The Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) mobilizes considerable and extensive efforts to contribute to addressing the fallout of Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.  Since the onset of the outbreak worldwide, ICESCO has launched several practical yet effective initiatives within the realm of its competence. To top these continued efforts, ICESCO has formed a global coalition to fight coronavirus pandemic and stem its present and future adverse effects on the Islamic world.

The significance of this coalition has been hailed by prominent international organizations and institutions, reaffirming their willingness to join the coalition and take part in supporting its noble goals financially or in kind.  It envisions to aid poor countries to address the outbreak of the virus, and stamp out its negative impact and overcome the current crisis.

The coalition covers and supplements field projects, executive programmes, foresight strategies for the Islamic world, and fund-raising campaigns to enable the Islamic world to face the challenges during and in the aftermath of the pandemic.

In this vein, ICESCO calls on Member States, their civil society institutions, regional and international organizations, development institutions and companies, donors, and banks to join the coalition to contribute to the achievement of its objectives and support a coalition that embodies solidarity and global unity in face of this severe crisis.

The initiative is part of a series of efforts and initiatives launched by the Organization to help its Member States to overcome the repercussions of coronavirus pandemic and stop the outbreak. These included US$200.000 ICESCO Prize Award for supporting scientific research to anyone who will discover an effective treatment or vaccine against Coronavirus (COVID-19), an initiative that was widely welcomed and lauded by the international community.

Subsequently, ICESCO launched “ICESCO Digital Home” with technological, educational and socio-cultural elements providing educational digital content, platforms for socio-cultural dialogue and family awareness-raising contents for all age groups. Moreover, ICESCO provided educational sectors in several Member States with technological devices and equipment to ensure the continuity of education during lockdowns, through the production of digital content on the internet.

For learners of non-speakers of the Arabic language, ICESCO launched an initiative to allow them the opportunity to remotely learn Arabic through video lessons, audiobooks, and interactive content. At the cultural level, the Organization, through its “Distance Culture” initiative, has developed programmes for developing talents and unleashing the potentials and artistic and creative capacities of the Islamic world’s youth and students. To this effect, ICESCO earmarked prizes to encourage creativity in the various creative fields.

Likewise, ICESCO supported the establishment of units for the production of low-cost sanitizers and their distribution to citizens in many Member States and the training of local communities’ groups to sustain this work. The prototype production has been recently started in the Republic of Mali.

These initiatives and programmes demonstrate that ICESCO is among the leading international organizations in addressing, under its fields of competence, the deleterious consequences of Coronavirus pandemic. ICESCO has been reaffirming that it will continue to monitor closely the effects of the outbreak of the Covid-19 on the educational, scientific and cultural levels in Member States.  Accordingly, the Organization will provide them with the most effective means to bolster efforts as the situation evolves. The new coalition will be the epitome of such undertakings.

As part of the continued effort of the Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) to support Member States in mitigating the impact of COVID-19 pandemic, and to bring about one of its several initiatives on the ground, a sanitizer production unit at the Science and Technology University in Bamako, Mali began producing hand sanitizers to distribute them to needy citizens.

This unit will produce 5,000 bottles of hand sanitizer and it is the first of the two units inaugurated with the support of ICESCO through the Malian National Commission for Education, Science, and Culture. This support is part of ICESCO’s project to provide technical and financial assistance to a number of some Islamic world countries to set up low-cost hand sanitizer production units and train locals in this field. The second unit will soon start its production activity at the University of Medicine in Mali.

The Minister of National Education, Higher Education and Scientific Research in the Republic of Mali, Dr. Mahamoudou Famanta, visited the production unit and expressed his satisfaction with the hand sanitizers produced, which will help curb the spread of COVID-19. The Minister also met with the working team (30 people) overseeing the production of sanitizers and training locals on this job.

It is noteworthy to mention that the cooperation between ICESCO and the Republic of Mali constitutes the first phase of this project, which will be replicated in the majority of the Member States and Muslim communities across the globe as per their needs. ICESCO is currently communicating with these countries to start implementation.

The Organization also reaffirms that it will continue to closely monitor the impact of COVID-19 spread on the educational, scientific, cultural and humanitarian situations in the Member States. The Organization will further provide its Member States with the most effective means to support their efforts vis-à-vis all developments, reaffirming its confidence in the ability of every nation to overcome this crisis.

ICESCO is considered one of the leading organizations at the international level in mitigating the impact of Coronavirus pandemic in its areas of competence. The Organization launched many practical initiatives to achieve such a goal, including “ICESCO Digital Home” on its website, www.icesco.org, which gives access to a remarkable list of digital contents in the fields of education, science, and culture.